Idrisah charging her beam attack in panel 3 here.
Transcript
Bip's avatar leans its head on one hand, irritated eyebrow quirked.
Bip: Sooo... if it's only a week, then why not just fire him?
Idrisah scowls, whips around, and jabs a finger at the tablet, startling Bip.
Idrisah: EXACTLY!
She turns away from Bip, who realizes with trepidatious relief that they aren't the target of her righteous anger.
Idrisah: Talita, you can't let them ignore this just because BASIC accountability would take SLIGHTLY more effort than sitting on their ass doing NOTHING!
Talita: I guess… It's just that Mel was basically my parent all through college. I don't want to sour our relationship over this…
Bip: Sounds to me like they're the one souring it.
Idrisah: Yeah! That's not fair! Screw their good will if they won't even keep you safe!
Bip turns the webcam's swivel motor to look at Idrisah and leans their avatar her way.
Bip: Right? They so obviously only care about maintaining business as usual. And frankly, demanding he be removed would be doing them a bigger favor than they've bothered to extend to you. This guy's a walking liability.
Idrisah: Oh, absolutely! At this point they've given you no reasonable options besides upsetting them!
91 thoughts on “Runaway to the Stars: Page 234”
pinkytoothless011
Oh hey, whatever Bip is saying is transferring on the screen thing they’re showing up on as text! They weren’t doing that before, and its showing what Idrisah is saying too! I bet that’s for the sake of Gillie. Since Bip doesn’t have a mouth and Idrisah is too mad to sign. Can’t remember if Gillie’s good at lip reading.
Hydrurgus
[RAPPORT BUILT]
WoomySans
I like how Idrisah is backlit by the nondiagetic death ray charging up behind her.
Payphone Call
No it’s diagetic, she really can just do that
athofear
iooyyghhgghn Bipp uuueueue i wioud do anything foar yuou😢😢😢 Panel 3 so poised ohhBip
guset
SUCH POISE AMD GRACE. goud bip……
mossrabbit
thats the thing about learned helplessness; you get taught nothing you do will change how people treat you, and you just start doing your best to minimize yourself so you can say it hurts less. in learned helplessness experiments with animals, the animals forced to learn to be helpless will refuse to get up off a painful electric floor even if the barrier between them and safety is visibly removed. they just believed that even if they got up, nothing would change. the researchers had to physically pick up the animals and move them to the safe zone to show them that things could be different.
i wish being rightgeously angry could help. all my friends would be in better situations if it did. but unfortunately, the only way to help talita is to physically show her things can and will change for her.
Talita Fangirl :)
To be honest, you blew my mind just now :0
Vinemaple
I wonder if that’s why my best friend has talked me into visiting her, out-of-state.
IncompleteMachine
God i feel this one. In the end i physically forced myself to move away from where i was but i odnt know how much good it has done me. its helped, but beating learned helplessness from inside is a nightmare.
Gheesfellow
Perhaps firing Adam before the end of his contract would call for compensation, since he wasn’t broken any ‘technical’ rule (not for lack of trying). Waiting it out is free and takes less paperwork.
JoB
*shrug* OK, let’s not “fire” him, then.
Where is he going to go back to? How many weeks of strict quarantine are required to enter there? We’d help him by starting that early, wouldn’t we?
… yo, Talita, could you help us moving this rather big isolation box onto the ferry? No, it’s very much not fragile, don’t worry …
Vinemaple
Oh, Adam has quite probably left a trail of actual safety violations, if Talita and Clayton could be encouraged to properly document and report them. The mock fights with Dominic, while in spacesuits, lack of concern about his surroundings while working in a spacesuit in a dangerous area, trying to climb an Avian ladder without even communicating to the rest of the team… Ixion has to have SOME level of safety regulations, and considering they’re a Jovian corporation, they’re probably stricter than Martian regulations, although that might be a low bar.
deathbypixelz
IDRISAH AND BIP GO OFF!!!!!!
Scyphi
Considering she’s been the one most opposed to all things Bip, I’m just waiting for the awkward moment when Idrisah realizes she and Bip are actually doing the forbidden thing–agreeing about something.
But yeah, agreeing with their assessment here. Too many people here are trying to avoid rocking the boat too much, but that boat’s already been rocked, so now what one SHOULD be doing is removing the thing that’s actually doing all the rocking before the boat flips from all that rocking, not try and ride it out and hope the rocking stops on its own before you all end up in the drink from it.
cypr
i would NOT want to be on the receiving end of idrisah and bip’s combined rage. idrisah’s snarly faces in this page are so good
Mitta
Divided by species. United by hate.
$ilverware
Heck yeah, Idrisah and Bip power team!
BoldlyGone
Bip’s reaction when Idrisah agrees with them lol
Gar G
They’re right
And I LOVE seeing them being on the same page like this! (especially with her being so caught up in this that she doesn’t realize it)
MissZena
I love how the thing that has finally gotten Idrisah and Bip to agree on something is them becoming a united front/combined voice of reason after what happened to Talita
Its a cool development considering how Idrisah has reacted towards Bip so far and it shows they do both care about her even if its hard to read what Bip is really thinking/feeling at times since they have a very devil may care attitude (I think that’s the right phrase for it)
rhiannon
Idrisah is doing the Woman Yelling At Cat in panel 3. amazing
Hunter
Calling it now, Bip is going to hack the system and fire Adam since Talita’s being too passive about it.
PostMortem7581
I like seeing Idrisah and Bip get righteously mad together. They’re bonding <3
Gringo
Idrisah x Bip Tag Team Lets GOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Avalon Ranger
IDRISAH, KILL!!! BEAM ATTACK EVERYTHING!!!
Eux
INCREDIBLE…..
INISHALLAH BY THEIR POWERS COMBINED DOUBLE BEAM ATTACK
Rad Internet Stranger
HELL YEAH IDRISAH, YOU KNOW WHATS UP
petra
i am imagining a sticker of idrisah with the starburst-style holographic pattern over it, accentuating her beam attack in that panel.
Zuorai
Runaway to the Stars realistic dialog compilation
Cobbington
Oh Idrisah how I love you
Bugs
It’s almost like being conditioned to be agreeable and inoffensive is really bad for you actually, and learning to have ‘rude’ boundaries is important
She’ll get there, Talita’s got some friends who are great at defending her right to be inconvenient 😀
Vinemaple
“Rude” boundaries indeed. I am so sick and tired of people calling it “rude” when I ask them to please stop causing problems for me or others, and acting like it’s me who’s causing a problem.
On the schooner, the rule for passengers disobeying safety regulations was, ask politely two times, then on the third time, yell at them. No accidents and no Coast Guard investigations is worth a couple bad Yelp reviews.
Athelind Llewellyn Long
As a former Coastie, I can confirm this. If it’s a choice between Being Mean To Someone and Calling Us Because Crisis, we will back you up any day of the week.
Cascayu
You know things are fucked when Idrisah and Bip agree on something like this
Effy Dubs
I love both the rationales you can draw from Idrisah and Bip to why you should get rid of Adam, and that a competent manager could have drawn them a long time before this even got here.
Where moral arguments (ruining cohesion, the assault, general bullying going on, etc.) like Idrisah’s fail, material (liability, H&S concerns, lawsuits, risk of wrongful death lawsuits from worker’s family etc.) ones from Bip tend to hit harder. Even if you say it’s an immoral corporation, they may still not want to risk a mass-casualty event if something goes wrong out there that could have been avoided by terminating a temp worker’s contract early. It’s not exactly a confined space, due to being more space than confinement, but it probably helps thinking of it in a similar manner. Even if the personnel in question “had-it-coming” (Adam), people could still get badly hurt if they go to recover him after an “accident”. Confined space rescue is a a whole career with a crazy high risk rate, and EVA rescue is bound to be similar. I doubt Ixion has one on standby on Dirtball, given the skeleton crew nature of the facility. So, even body recovery would be dicey, and traumatizing to the employee doing it who likely have a relationship to the deceased, which is more money and time loss down the hole. At that rate, whatever it costs for early termination is significantly cheaper than opening so many cans of worms that you’d think they were pivoting to a bait shop model.
Seriousness aside, expressions on everyone is great! Love the back-an-forth and the 4-in-1 silicone lube spray can on the desk in the final panel. 4-in-1! For when you need a secret, fourth thing to move!
forthebit
I actually wasn’t sure at first if Bip was genuinely irritated with Mel/Adam’s behavior, or if they were egging Idrisah on for their own ends. The transcript description seems to imply the former, which is an interesting insight into Bip’s emotional range (though I guess we’d already gotten a bit of that from Calcery).
JoB
Later, on the SpacePhone …
AdamTheGreat: Done as agreed. How’s it look on your end?
UnknownCaller: Quite fine. It seems that you won’t even get fired for it, or anything official.
ATG: Hey, don’t get the idea that you can keep the extra one week’s pay just ’cause Ixion will still pay it to me! Those extra bucks were part of our deal.
UC: You make it sound like you didn’t know me and my work ethics at all …
ATG: Har har. I actually know nothing about you!
UC: Well, that’s great to hear, since I actually have no means to pay you at all.
ATG: WHAT!?!? Listen, you scumbag, all I need to do is to walk over to Ixion offices and show them this chat on my tablet and …
Tablet: FACTORY RESET INITIATED
SECURE-WIPING USER DATA …
Vinemaple
Actually, 4-in-1 is specifically for lubricating *silicone* components.
Genko
It’s really tragic seeing Talita not want to fuck up her relationship with someone who clearly does not take their role in her life seriously. There’s not much to save, but she has so little that she’s attached to this. I look forward to seeing her have better options.
AsTheJayFlies
mx ‘my kids wont talk to me’ is about to have another estrangement coming…
IncompleteMachine
Not an unexpected one.
Sunstorm
This is why I love Bip so much. When we first meet them, it appears that Bip’s whole deal is being a sort of charmingly annoying trickster archetype. They just give off an aura of sillyness in the way they refuse to answer personal questions at first, and the way they discuss committing crimes with such glee. But then when things get serious, they reveal that they are, in fact, capable of emotional maturity. I love a character who can go from silly to serious in a heartbeat. Bip is great.
Zofifi
Good friends right there! Angry FOR you when you don’t have it in you to get mad yourself.
“Dearest beloved friend, let us kick your dad’s/mom’s ass plsss?🥺”
Jackie
The energy of the comments over this situation finally showing up in universe is awesome haha. But I feel Talitas exhaustion/defeat over this so deeply as well
Ruby
Hmmm. Sweet, sweet vindication.
I’d also like to read Gillie’s take on the matter (if she has one besides what’s been said already).
Accursed Dirt Boar
THEY ARE SAYING WHAT WE WERE ALL THINKING!
WayanayaW
IDRISAH BEAM ATTACK… GO!
Lilac
Omg…. theyre bonding over Pointing Out Bullshit….. its beautiful……
Ave Zancuda
WONDERFUL!
furubatsu
Turns out the key to friendship was Rightious Anger all along…
MoonyBeasty
Such a fantastic thing to witness
Scolopendra
I know last time I said Idrisah was on the side of the angels but now she’s got a _glory_ going on. Righteous indignation so pure it generates its own halo.
Scottoro
I love to see Idrisah and Bip bonding over standing up for Talita! This is definitely going to be a important turning point in thier relationship, and I’m curious how long it will take everyone to seriously consider that Talita flying off with Bip might be a better option than staying stuck here.
Sabella
Really hoping this page helps readers understand why Mel is such a problem and why so many have been calling out their behavior in the comments. So the saying goes, “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”.
Icarus Eldridge
to me Mel is suchh an interesting character because they represent those people who are well-meaning but still harmful and I think this comic does SUCH a good job with addressing these issues and it’s just. AUGH!! it’s the fact that they want to help to some extent, but are only willing to go to superficial lengths to actually DO anything and it’s!!! RUURUGHHGSH!!!! and that’s the worst bc if confronted they would probably just go like “what are you talking about? of course I care about you, of course I want to help- I AM helping, I don’t understand why you’re so upset with me when I’m on your side” etc. but the fact of the matter is complacency isn’t enough!! andnajrhjHJRUAURAHAAGFHGHH!!!!!!!!!!!! I am losing the ability to formulate speech but you see yes
Rose
YES yes exactly!! i am shaking your hand in solidarity and understanding
Vinemaple
What I see a lot of is people who want to see themselves as “good” people without actually making any effort or taking any responsibility or risk. They want to keep doing whatever they want, but at the same time they want to see themselves as, and be seen by others as, a deeply altruistic person who always does the right thing.
And woe betide anyone who points out that they’re not being helpful or altruistic, or who brings up any problems they’re causing for others.
eden
yes! and it’s such a problem especially when people want to position themselves as anti racist or anti sexist, and is another layer of the problems here that people who are agreeing with mel aren’t picking up on, or are too used to dealing with they think it’s okay. loving everyone here
Marcie
To paraphrase Steven Sondheim’s Into The Woods: They’re not good, they’re not bad, they’re just Nice.
EnchantressEmily
Ooh, impressive work on drawing Bip from that sharp angle in panel 5!
Zidane
i love the detail in the sixth panel of bips camera/mic turning to “face” idrisah, thats a cool way to show they’re having a sort of eye contact while talking to her even if the screen theyre displayed on is facing a different way.
theotherther1
It seems like Mel is too self-absorbed to understand the damage they’re doing to Talita. Their kids and Calcery have gone low to no contact, they work on a crappy nowhere planet, and they just can’t see the pattern here. As unlikely as it is, I hope Mel someday realizes that they’re treating Talita unfairly, and that their emotional abuse has left scars on her.
SSClownShine
My favorite chapters of RTTS are the ones where Idrisah uses her powers
Mobi-gg
It’s so cathartic to see Idrisah and Bip say all this to Talita. She needs to hear it so bad
tyrone
Just let Adam kill himself by not leaping in and saving his A** next time.
A week ? He will not last an hour!
Michi
Problem is that he most likely is going to someone with him if he does something stupid.
LittleRedRidingNerd
Yeah! Like the catwalk incident. If something happened it could have collapsed, hurt the crew, and possibly hurt the rest of dirtball due to destroying the network. Also, the whole incorrect usage of heavy machinery is a double nono.
Adrienne
I love that Idrisah’s sign-name is “beaming smile” (if I recall) but it turns out her rage is a beam too… and she’s chargin it
Sabella
Light can provide warmth, but it can also be focused on a narrow point.
NotOkapi
And to illuminate what’s gone wrong!
Sabella
Just so~
joey
Idrisah would be a Light player, got it.
CameoAppearance
Hmm, but what class, though? Personally I’m thinking Witch, because she’s got a lot of the same energy as Jade and Feferi.